


your love is scaring me

by annabethsperseus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas, Cuddling & Snuggling, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Hogwarts Seventh Year, No Plot/Plotless, Pre-Canon, Sickfic, i love my kids, im serious there is no plot, just jily cuteness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:20:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21565993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annabethsperseus/pseuds/annabethsperseus
Summary: Lily gets a cold over Christmas. James takes care of her.
Relationships: James Potter/Lily Evans Potter
Comments: 3
Kudos: 65





	your love is scaring me

**Author's Note:**

> title is from "scary love" by the neighbourhood and bears no relation to this story but it slaps

For a boy who grew up with so many house elves, James Potter sure does know how to make a good cup of tea.

It’s not surprising that Lily came down with a cold in this winter. The window next to her bed is icy, blurring the view of the narrow lane outside her house. Clouds and dark trees obscure the late morning sunlight. Lily glances at the clock as she turns over in her bed, surprised to find it already ten, given the relative darkness of the room.

Having James in her room in a shocking integration of her two worlds. Well, an integration between her world and the world she had all but grown out of in the last seven years. And really, his presence shouldn’t be so shocking. She’s had Mary and Marlene and Alice all in this room before and Severus before them. But James is particularly jarring.

But perhaps that’s not because he’s a wizard but instead because he’s her real-life, serious teenage boyfriend, serious enough to warrant staying at her house over the holidays. 

“Hey,” Lily croaks, her throat blazing as she does. James quickly looks up from the Quidditch magazine he’s been paging through. The corners of his mouth tug up just a little as he realizes that she’s awake and sets the magazine down on her desk, forgotten. 

“Hey,” he responds. “I made you tea.” He nudges at the steaming cup on her sidetable. She takes a sip and recognizes the ginger tea that her mother always keeps in the kitchen. It’s hot, but it placates her throat as she takes another deep sip. 

“Thanks,” she mutters after swallowing. Her voice still cracks a bit. It’s inconvenient, really, that as soon as she has any free time, she’s sick. She wishes she was still at Hogwarts or at the Potters’, where she could brew up some Pepper-Up Potion in no time. But instead she’s in her Cokeworth bedroom, confined to Muggle cough syrup until she or James has time to Apparate out and get some.

“I already owl’d Padfoot. He should be sending over some Pepper-Up soon,” James says, almost reading her mind as he takes a seat at the foot of her bed and rests a hand on her covered foot. “You were really out cold. I guess that’s what you get when you combine that last week of assignments with a cold.” 

“What time did Mum leave?” Lily asks. Muggle midwives don’t have the same generous holidays as Hogwarts students, so James would have to care for her during the day until the twenty-second. Merlin, she was hoping to be recovered by the twenty-second. 

“Around 8:30. I’m under very firm direction to give you a dose of that ugly purple thing at eleven,” James nods at the glass bottle of cough syrup sitting next to her mug of tea. 

“Potions look worse,” Lily teases as she sits up slightly. James watches her, a bit concerned, but ultimately resigns to looking down again, rubbing the soles of her feet from above her sheets. They sit in a warm, comfortable silence for a moment, Lily sipping her tea and James rubbing her feet.

“You know, this isn’t exactly what I imagined being in your bedroom for the first time would be,” James hums after a few minutes. 

Lily has to think for a moment before responding. James had been to the small Cokeworth home before; he dropped by over the summer, but he certainly hadn’t been in her bedroom at that point. Petunia would not have approved of that. But now, Petunia was gone, and it was just James and Lily staying with Lily’s mother for Christmas.

“Did you expect us to be snogging incessantly with my mum one door down?” 

“Yes, “ James breathes, smiling his normal, irksome, ridiculously attractive smirk. “We do it enough at school with our friends walking in, anyway.”

Lily’s face reddens, and James laughs. “Of course, I don’t want to catch whatever plague you’re carrying now.” Lily smiles now, and she moves to get closer to him. She tries to wrap her arms around him, and he feigns fear of her and her illness, scooting away and grabbing her wrists. They sit facing each other, their knees touching, as James rubs his hands up and down her arms.

“You’re warm,” he remarks, frowning as he feels her forehead.

“Nothing the Pepper-Up won’t fix,” she counters. “Though I’m afraid it will be a rather boring first day for you.” James had seen some of the town coming in, but today was supposed to be their first day out. Of course, one day wouldn’t be such a loss. There wasn’t much to see beyond the lane her house was on, and she thinks both of them would rather not see Severus out and about. 

“It’s fine.” James moves his hands from her arms to her thigh, his fingers stretching upwards. She shivers as she feels his hand through the thin fabric of her pajama pants. “I am in my girlfriend’s room for the first time.” Lily laughs heartily, but they both hear the sound in her chest as she does. She begins to cough, and he sweeps her into his lap, stroking her hair and patting her back. 

“It might be time for that cold syrup,” James remarks once she’s done, reaching across her to grab it. Lily shakes her head.

“It’ll make me drowsy. We might as well just wait until the potion gets here.” 

“I don’t know, love, Sirius might not be awake for another few hours, and Moony’s over, so it might take him a while to send it…” James trails off. Lily groans and buries her face in the crook of his neck, rubbing her nose against the wool of his red jumper. 

The cough syrup makes her gag, but her chest immediately feels less tight, and she can relax in his arms again. James presses a kiss to her thick, auburn hair and places a hand to her back, rubbing circles into her shoulder blades.

She still gets flutters in her stomach and shivers when James touches her. She should be used to it by now They’ve been together for nearly three months and have done far more intimate things than this, but he’s… James, and his touch still makes her want to melt. 

Three months. Just by time alone, their relationship should not be serious enough to bring him home for Christmas. Certainly not serious enough to warrant the upcoming double date with Petunia and Vernon. But James is different. He’s special. Their relationship is both more intense and calmer than any fling she’s had before, and three months with him is both like three years and three days. 

“I love you,” she murmurs as she sways in his arms, yawning. It’s not the first time she’s said it, and they’ve said it ad nauseam since that first tine. But it’s definitely the first time she’s said it to a boy in her bedroom, and James is special. 

He plays with a strand of her hair. “I think the syrup is kicking in.” He lifts her from his arms and places her under the crumpled sheets. She whines as he releases her, but he smirks and kicks off his shoes, sliding in next to her. He places his chin over her head, and she wraps her arms around his torso, snuggling closer. She’s suddenly cold now despite her fever, and she wants to get closer. 

“This is another first for my room,” she says into his sweater. She can feel the vibrations of his chuckle in his chest.

“Not for me. I had another redhead girlfriend who worked herself to death right before Christmas and I had to take care of her.” Lily moves to swat him once she realizes he’s joking, but he just pulls her tighter against him. “I love you, too.”

They lay in comfortable silence, and even with her runny nose and sore throat, she falls asleep quickly, listening to his breath and feeling his warmth wrapped around her. The tea on her nightstand goes cold, and they wake up, entangled in each other, to the sound of an owl tapping at the window.

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this instead of studying for spanish oops
> 
> also the italics got messed up but you know what. i have a spanish test i probably should be studying for.


End file.
